Sign-up Bonus: Free $15 OboPay PrePaid Credit Card

In celebration of getting $29 million in new financing from investors, Obopay is offering a free $15 Prepaid MasterCard for signing up for their service. They seem to also be a money transfer service like PayPal mobile.

I received numerous verification error messages. When I went back later to try again, the verification option was gone. If I was verified somehow, then they opted not to give me the money, ’cause my account balance is still zero. Anyone else have this problem?

I would say stay away from Obopay.
(1) They said you can add money by doing ACH transfer from your linked bank account. But after you signed up, you will find they don?t offer this option. I called the customer service and they told me it?s their future project, not now. (but you will find it in their “fee schedule” and it looks like they already have this feature) In other words, you have to fund your account with credit/debit card and pay 1.5% extra, and there?s no way to get around with it. (2) Also when I withdraw to my bank account, they charge me 10 cents which did not listed in their fee schedule. I feel this company is not in a honest condition and would never do business with them. I will just stay with PayPal now.

Yes I did use 1% cash back credit card to fund the account and I withdrew all the money plus bonus back to my bank account. That’s all I would do. I would never give them my SSN or anything else to get their debit card, which you can only use it without extra charge on making purchase. If you use their debit card at any ATM, though they don’t charge you, the ATM owner will, and certainly do, charge you. I can’t see any reason to have their debit card.

Besides, (1) I think this is a stupid invention. I don’t like to use cellphone to send money. (2)Non of their service is free. I’d just stay with PayPal, which is free for personal account. (3) They will double the price very soon. (4) They are not honest on their fee schedule.

Hmmm…….giving them SS# for verification? Are they going for a hard credit pull? On the other hand, they also give you an option of using Driver License for verification purpose. What are they trying to verify anyway?

I got in on the free $15 and ordered the debit card which came in a timely fashion. The one thing that is not timely is adding money to the card from a bank account. It took three business days for the debit to hit the bank account. It showed up this morning. The credit still isn’t showing on the obopay account. Since I’m just playing with it, I’m not concerned but I would certainly be hesitant to depend on this service for something serious.

Paypal doesn’t have cell phone money transfer (yet) but they are much faster and you actually earn something on the money sitting in a Paypal account. If obopay expects to succeed they will have to improve the speed of the add money function.

I got in on the $10. Verification was easy, and I transferred the $10 back to my bank account. I should probably close my Obopay account now since I know that I will never be using it, and I don’t want to be hit with a fee in the future.

Customers that sign up with a bogus SSN will not go through. Obopay currently uses Equifax to verify customer’s identity, to keep fraud from happening. That’s pretty smart, if you ask me. There is a monthly maintenance fee if you do not load funds every month. And you only receive $10 if you load $10 onto your card and send a person to person. If you’ve got a friend on Obopay, send the $10 to them, have them send it back to you.. still a free $10.

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